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Shannon Marie Robinson Outsider Online sources for research

n 1922, German psychiatrist Hans Prinzhorn for mentally or physically disabled . Art Ipublished The Artistry of the Mentally Ill. that was once hidden away in hospital files The artwork of psychiatric patients published or seen only by the is now internation- in the book was of great interest to experi- ally bought and sold. In turn, outsider art is mental artists like , , beginning to be taken seriously in academia. and , who had come to find the Scholarly books and journals are emerging, established banal. Dubuffet coined expanding the genre away from its Eurocen- the term Art Brut to describe works of art tric history and offering more international produced by the mentally disabled. perspectives. Fifty years later, art scholar Roger Cardinal This is not a comprehensive list of out- wrote the first English-language book on the sider art resources. While some galleries topic of Art Brut. Cardinal’s publisher thought and institutions have strong international the term Art Brut sounded too aggressive for reputations, their websites lack information a book title,1 so Cardinal changed the title and images. Resources recommended here to Outsider Art, the first instance this term have an informative web presence and are was used. Outsider art became a label for available in English. all artists creating outside the mainstream art world, including vernacular artists, children, Publications self-taught artists, and mentally and/or physi- • Elsewhere-The International Jour- cally disabled artists. Outsider artists work nal of Self-Taught and Outsider Art. This without the influence of modern culture, peer-reviewed journal is associated with the they create solely to fulfill a personal need, Self-Taught and Outsider Art Research Col- without intention to exhibit or sell. lection (STOARC) at Sydney College of the Mental health and social conditions are , The University of Sydney-Australia. The often considered when identifying an artwork first issue was published in August 2013. The as outsider. Adolf Wölfi, one of the first artists journal is open access and all issues are avail- to be considered an outsider, spent his adult able as PDFs; print copies are available for years in a psychiatric hospital. The prolific purchase. Colin Rhodes, founding director of artist and novelist was a janitor. STOARC, is the editor, and the editorial board Outsider artworks can be miniature, such as includes scholars such as Roger Cardinal British artist Ben Wilson’s chewing gum paint- and the Executive Director of SPACES (listed ings, or large-scale environmental works like ’s Ideal Palace in . Entire galleries and museums are now Shannon Marie Robinson is fine arts liaison librarian dedicated to exhibiting outsider art, and at Denison University, email: [email protected] various organizations provide studio space © 2015 Shannon Marie Robinson

January 2015 43 C&RL News under Organizations) Jo Farb Hernández. Back issues of the museum’s magazine, Folk Access: http://stoarc.com/. Art, in publication from 1971 to 2008, are • Out of Art. This is a Dutch magazine also available online. Access: http://www. available by subscription. However, Out of folkartmuseum.org/. Art offers English summa- • American Museum. tions of its articles on the This is the first museum in the United States website. The summaries to focus on collecting outsider art and the introduce readers to new website is as eclectic as the collection. Each outsider artists and orga- annual exhibition focuses on popular themes nizations. A link to the art- within self-taught art such as religion, tech- ists’ websites, galleries, or nology, or . Search the website’s organizations is included Past Exhibitions pages for images and de- with each summary. Access: scriptions. The most useful section of the http://www.out-of-art.nl/index.php?pageid website is Our Visionaries, which provides =english&catid=english. brief biographies of the artists represented • Raw Vision. Raw Vision magazine in the permanent collection. Access: http:// has been publishing outsider art scholarship www.avam.org/. for 25 years. Though the magazine is only • The Anthony Petullo Collection of available through a subscription, the website Self-Taught and Outsider Art. In 2010, art offers a many free resources. An introductory collector Anthony Petullo donated much of essay and glossary help the novice under- his European outsider art collection to the Mil- stand the history and terminology of outsider waukee Art Museum.2 Through The Collec- art. A bibliography, though not updated for tion section of the website, visitors may view the 21st century, is in-depth and international individual works and read artists biographies. in scope, and a blog roll keeps readers up- The History of Self-Taught and Outsider Art dated on exhibitions and related news. The is a lengthy bibliography with excerpts from videos page links to YouTube videos on out- the recommended books. There are two sider artists, including interviews and tours of short videos about outsider art and a list of visionary environments. There are also links links to recommended galleries, web mate- to galleries and organizations. Access: http:// rial on individual artists, and other resources. rawvision.com/home. Access: http://www.petulloartcollection. org/index.cfm. • Collection de l’Art Brut. Jean Dubuf- fet donated his Art Brut collection to the city of , in Switzerland, in the early Museum and gallery collections 1970s. It remains one of the world’s most • American Museum. This important collections of outsider art, with museum has a collection of new work added regularly. The website pro- works by self-taught vides ample information for readers new to artists. The museum has outsider art. The collection may be searched four of Henry Darger’s by artist name (called authors). Each artist original manuscripts profile includes a sampling of artwork and and thousands of his a short biography. Current and past exhibi- source material items. tions include an overview of the exhibit and Images of dozens of links to reviews and related news. The entire Darger’s and collection’s digitized inventory, along with hundreds of works by other Lausanne art collections, is available other outsider artists to search in French. There are also links to are available online. other outsider art collections and information

C&RL News January 2015 44 on current events in the field. Access: http:// news articles. The Media section also links www.artbrut.ch/en/21070/collection-art to news and videos. Under the heading Ver- -brut-lausanne. nacular Art, viewers will find images from • Galerie Christian Berst. This Paris the gallery collection and sales. The gallery gallery specializes in Art Brut. The website also has a free quarterly online magazine, provides a history of the art movement, a fluence, with image-heavy articles about bibliography, and links to other Art Brut artists and exhibitions. Access: http://www. organizations. Allowing viewers to find riccomaresca.com/. artists’ profiles by country or time period is a helpful research tool. Each artist pro- Organizations file includes a biography, bibliography, • Creative Growth Art Center. Located and selected images. Web pages for ex- in San Francisco, the center includes a hibitions, past and present, include press studio and gallery. The studio offers artists statements and selected images from the with disabilities programming and space show. The gallery’s exhibition catalogs to explore their creative practices. Their are bilingual and can be viewed online. work is exhibited in the gallery as well as Access: http://www.christianberst.com/en in international galleries and museums, /home.html. including the Creative Growth gallery in • Galerie Gugging. This Austrian gallery Paris. Images of the artwork and brief biog- exhibits Art Brut artists, old and contem- raphies of the center’s artists are available porary, as well as the artists referred to as on the website. The News section of the Gugging Artists. These mentally ill artists site is helpful for keeping up to date on live in a group home, the House of Artists, international outsider art exhibitions. More in the village of Gugging, near the Galerie. news and images of work are available The gallery’s website provides brief artist through the center’s Facebook and Flickr biographies and PDF versions of the ex- pages. Access: http://creativegrowth.org hibition catalogs, available in German and /category/news/. English. Access: http://www.gugging.org/en Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and /galerie_ausstellungen/exhibitions. Outsider Art. This -based institution • The Prinzhorn Collection. The col- provides education programming, events, lection is limited to works created by psy- and chiatric patients, mostly German and many exhibi- diagnosed schizophrenic. Though images of tions. the artworks are not available on the site, Most the Overview and History sections provide signifi- an introduction to the work of psychiatrist cantly, Hans Prinzhorn and this important historical Intuit houses the Henry Darger Room, a collection. Access: http://www.rzuser.uni- collection of the materials from Chicago heidelberg.de/~gf7/index_eng.shtml. artist Henry Darger’s apartment. Information • Ricco Maresca Gallery. This New York about the Henry Darger Room and links to City gallery showcases self-taught artists and short biographies about Intuit’s artists are publishes books on outsider and vernacu- found under Collection. Visitors can also lar artists. In the Artists section of the site, view images from the permanent collec- each profile tion, though without any information about includes a the artworks. The center’s magazine, The biography, Outsider, is published twice a year; some images, older issues are free online through the and links Publications & Store section. Access: http:// to related www.art.org/.

January 2015 45 C&RL News • Outsider Art Fair. Starting in 1993, artist, plenty of images of their artworks, and the Outsider Art Fair is an annual event of a bibliography for further reading. Access: dozens of international galleries showcasing http://www.detourart.com/. works from the outsider artists they repre- • Fred Scruton Photography and sent. Now managed by gallery owner and Videography. Fred Scruton is an artist and art dealer Andrew Edlin, the fair is held in professor at Edinboro University of Penn- New York City and Paris. Two films on the sylvania. He has written and photographed website introduce the viewer to the fair and for Raw Vision magazine. Much of his pho- some of the prominent curators and scholars. tography documents the lives and artwork The site also provides an historical overview of outsider and folk artists. The Projects sec- of outsider art and hundreds of artist biog- tion of Scruton’s website includes portraits raphies with selected bibliographies. The of outsider artists and images of American News section is a Tumblr blog of current visionary environments. Under the Artists/ exhibitions and articles about outsider art. Messengers menu, viewers will find more Access: http://www.outsiderartfair.com/. detailed photo essays on select artists. There • Souls Grown Deep Foundation. are also biographical videos document- The foundation exhibits and preserves the ing the creative process of three artists. work of African American self-taught artists Scruton connects to articles and websites from the American South. Each artist has a about the artists he photographs through profile page with a biography and images the Links and Blog sections. Access: http:// of artwork. There is a separate section of fredscruton.com/. the site for the Gee’s Bend quilt makers, • Narrow Larry’s World of the Out- including an overview and biographies of standing. Though the website is cumber- each of the quilters. The News and Events some, it’s a treasure trove of links and section links to articles and videos about documents related to outsider art. “Narrow” African American outsider artists and related Larry Harris is a Houston-based architect issues. Access: http://soulsgrowndeep.org/. dedicated to photographing and archiving • SPACES. SPACES (Saving and Pre- American visionary environments.3 The best serving Arts and Cultural Environments) is material is under the heading Visionary dedicated to documenting and preserving Folk Art Environments. Interactive Google visionary environments and self-taught art. maps link viewers to either documentation The archive contains tens of thousands of of the environment on Harris’ website or to photographs, videos, and artists’ documents a web page for the artwork. Links to indi- on more than 1,400 international sites, with vidual works include images from his per- an emphasis on American sites. About a sonal visits to the sites. Access: http://www. third of the collection is available online, narrowlarry.com/index.html. searchable by keyword or location. Viewers can also browse by environment types such Notes as interior spaces, gardens, or monuments. 1. Willem Volkersz, “Roger Cardinal on Access: http://spacesarchives.org/. Outsider Art,” Raw Vision 22 (1998): 24-25. 2. Mary Louise Schumacher, “Collector Blogs and other websites of Outside Art to Donate Pieces,” Journal • Detour Art. This is the website of Kelly Sentinel (Milwaukee, Wisconsin), Sept. 29, Ludwig, a graphic designer who is passion- 2010, www.jsonline.com/entertainment ate about outsider and folk art. The site is /arts/104052428.html. easy to navigate, and Ludwig blogs about 3. Kelly Ludwig, “Happy Birthday ‘Nar- self-taught artists, visionary environments, row’ Larry Harris!,” Detour Art (blog), March and other resources related to outsider art. 4, 2013, www.detourart.com/happy-birthday Each post includes a brief biography of the -narrow-larry-harris/.

C&RL News January 2015 46